Evaluation of the contribution of argan tree to rural household income and comparison of its profitability in different production systems

Abstract

The present work aims to evaluate the contribution of the argan tree to rural household income and to compare the profitability of two models of exploitation of argan products (with and without valorization).The quantification of the contribution of different production activities for the study of income, in order to underline the contribution of the argan tree to the micro-economic level, showed variable results from the argan tree ranging from 45 % to 94 % , an average of 66 % for the year 2016. The argan could achieve an average gross margin of about 2807 dhs per hectare. As for the evaluation of the profitability of the argan tree exploitation methods, the results in deterministic environment showed that the argan tree could be profitable even by marketing its products without any valorization. With two different indicators, the economic performances of the exploitation models with valorization far exceed those of sale of argan products without valorization. By subjecting the variables at risk to a large fluctuation, the Monte Carlo simulation shows that the probability of recording a negative NPV is 0 %.